This 3rd Sunday of Lent brings us back to what was presented on the 1st Sunday of Lent. This being that the devil is the great tempter and so we are told that Christ “had cast out the devil.” This passage makes reference to those who are left deaf and dumb which in the words of Titus of Bostra is to say, “He calls the devil deaf or dumb, as being the cause of this calamity, that the Divine word should not be heard. For the devil, by taking away the quickness of human feeling, blunts the hearing of our soul.”
To Christ’s healing miracle there were those whose hearts were so hardened that they claimed that He was “casting out devils in the name of Beelzebub, the price of devils.” He turns this statement around and reminds exactly whose Kingdom this is. Christ has come to destroy the kingdom of Satan and to establish the kingdom of God.
We must allow this Kingdom to be made manifest on this earth. There are many ways in which our hearing has been blunted and due to this reality the Divine word is unable to be heard within our life. It is very difficult to be a Christian because our culture spreads a message which is so often contrary to the faith. Over the course of time we become desensitized to sin and no longer see it as being such. Television, music, magazines, and other forms of media all bombard our minds with messages which cause great confusion.
In the midst of these culture wars there are those who have been led astray and solely see the Church as being a social club who is committed to social work instead of being the beacon of faith and morals. Therefore, the family finds itself under attack and the child within the womb finds itself under attack. We cannot take relative positions concerning faith and morals for our Lord reminds that a kingdom divided against itself will not stand.
Therefore, we must begin to stay close to Christ and the Church. We must begin to engage the culture in order that it may once again proclaim Christ and His mercy. In such a manner we begin to open up our ears to the voice of Christ and rebuke the attacks of the devil. Then we are able to hear the Divine word within our life to the point that we desire to conform our life to it.
This Lenten season serves as the perfect opportunity to do precisely this. We must open ourself up to God and His mercy. We must come to frequent the sacrament of Confession. We ought to analyze the messages that we are bringing into our life and home through our engaging in our culture and ask if these are healthy images which are leading us unto the Lord or towards confusion. There is no room in our faith for relativism for there is only room for Christ who is the Way the Truth and the Life.
Let us desire to hear the Lord more clearly and to serve Him in though, word, and deed. Let us strive not for the kingdom of Satan, but for the Kingdom of God.
No comments:
New comments are not allowed.